Hyperactive Sarkozy shines at his first EU summit

BRUSSELS, June 23 (Reuters) French President Nicolas Sarkozy won his first major diplomatic victory at a European Union summit this week, brokering a deal to reform the bloc's institutions with a characteristic late-night burst of activity.

EU leaders meeting in Brussels aimed to agree on a mandate to overhaul decision-making but Polish President Lech Kaczynski and his twin brother prime minister Jaroslaw repeatedly rejected a compromise on voting rights, throwing the whole plan in doubt.

With no breakthrough on the last evening of the gruelling two-day summit, Sarkozy called several leaders into his office for talks with the Polish president and phone calls with his brother in Warsaw, emerging shortly before midnight with a deal.

''We were not far from a split. But I can say that France never gave up,'' Sarkozy told reporters in the early hours of Saturday, when all 27 countries had backed the agreement.

''We are extremely satisfied this morning,'' he added.

The EU has almost doubled its member states in three years but kept its old decision-making mechanisms after French and Dutch voters rejected an EU constitution in 2005 aimed at streamlining the process, effectively burying that text.

Sarkozy, who was elected last month on a platform of sweeping economic and social reform, pledged in the campaign to make overhauling EU institutions a top foreign policy priority.

His initiative brought together British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker for talks with the Poles.

Earlier, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who holds the rotating EU presidency, had told the Poles she would move ahead on a new treaty with or without their blessing -- a move which spurred a revolt by Warsaw's friends but also triggered a flurry of activity by Sarkozy.

HAND IN HAND Despite stealing some of the limelight from Merkel -- dubbed the ''Summit Queen'' by German media for a string of diplomatic coups -- Sarkozy said it was a joint effort.

''I can say that we worked hand in hand with Angela Merkel,'' a beaming Sarkozy said at his closing news conference.

German officials were quick to claim credit for the hard-fought deal, painting Merkel's ultimatum as the bold move that forced Warsaw back to the negotiating table.

After her broadside, Merkel immediately encouraged Sarkozy to approach the Polish twins in an orchestrated ''good-cop, bad-cop'' act, they said.

The deal puts off until 2017 rather than 2009 the full introduction of new voting rules for the 27-nation bloc, a concession to the Poles.

It also includes many elements of the constitution, such as the creation of a long-term EU president, but can be ratified by parliaments, avoiding the need to consult voters by referendum.

Britain won an exemption from the application in Britain of a legally binding EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, as well as the right not to join police and judicial cooperation.

Sarkozy said there were important concessions to France, including the removal of a reference to ''free and undistorted competition'' from the EU's objectives and adding a reference to the Union contributing to the security of its citizens.

Those changes could ''give Europe a little more humanity'', Sarkozy said, an apparent reference to voters in the French referendum who feared competition from eastern European states with lower labour costs.

Reuters GP DS1403